What's For Dinner tonite?

[Yhottys]

Murray's making even more gingerbread lab cookies. We've gone through the first batch of cookies we baked earlier this week but we made a huge batch of dough - so a bakin' we will go!

Gemma helped out by making dinner tonight. Pad Krapow over steamed rice. Pad Krapow Moo – spicy stir-fried pork with Thai holy basil « Chez Pim

Maybe some gingerbread labs for dessert.

[Steelegood]

Well, we finally finished the Gingerbread Village . We ended up with 4 houses & one church . Some looked like misshaped buildings, but the intended recipients won't/didn't mind. After admiring our fine handiwork, we found it hard to part with them , considering how hard we had worked on them, but then we did eat more than our share of bits and pieces of everything . After delivering them, we're not sure if they will see the light of Christmas day, we witnessed too many kids "drooling" over the candy and sugar coated....., baked confections. For dinner we treated ourselves to a night out of the kitchen.

Happy Holidays ,

Terry, Natalie, Audrey & Alisha.

[Yhottys]

Wow Natalie, Terry, Audrey and Alisha!

Your gingerbread village is amazing. We love all of the different varieties of candies you used. We think our favorite is the twisted lollipop, but the white pretzels on the rooftop is very clever.

We hope you do it all again next year. Kinda like a new traditiion.

Thank you for sharing.

Merry Christmas!

P.s. There was a gingerbread house contest at the grocery store and apparently it wasn't the store's first rodeo. All of the entries were sealed in cellophane. The girls' gingerbread houses would probably have kicked butt.

[Yhottys]

Today was our monthaversary. We celebrated by staying home and having pizza. Vicolo goat cheese pizza with a cornmeal crust from Whole Foods. Vicolo Pizza Murray didn't have to cook and thought it was his birthday!

Teuscher Champagne Truffes for dessert. Teuscher San Francisco

Aargh! We apologize for the rotated images. We've attempted several times to post the images of the Teuscher Champagne Truffes box right-side up but to no avail. (They still taste the same.)

[Steelegood]

Glad you enjoyed our endeavors with the gingerbread houses. It really did seem to be a shame not to share them with everyone, considering it is the holiday season (and I hoped to evoke some fond Christmas memories others may have had but not thought about in awhile, but not necessarily or specifically relative to what we did). We really do have quite a few more pictures....., but didn't want to overwhelm everyone with all of them. Next year, I think we will try to recreate the Biltmore Estate or Grove Park Inn, both in Asheville NC. ! I'm glad I'm not the only one "picture orientationally" challenged! If you noticed, many of my pictures are sideways. They look right when I upload, but revert to the original rotation.

Merry X-Mas.

Terry, et al

[Yhottys]

Tonight we had grilled lamb chops with brussel sprout leaves and chopped boiled eggs dressed in a citrus champagne vinaigrette and steamed rice.

One gingerbread lab cookie for dessert.

Merry Christmas everyone!

[Yhottys]

We were at Gemma's brother's family's (wow - three apostrophe's used in three consecutive words) home yesterday and our sister-in-law, Penny, made a gingerbread carousel. Our ten year old nephew, Christian, and twelve year old niece, Alana, helped decorate it.

After dinner there was a holiday house decorating contest. (Everyone was a winner.) Below are two of the entries. The colorful graham cracker house was decorated by twelve year old Morgan. Her twin sister, Kennedy, described her entry as being in a "blizzard". To say it was a study in contrasts would be an understatement.

[Yhottys]

Appetizers, first.

There was futomaki sushi, a crudite plate with bell peppers, artichoke jalapeno dip, red pepper hummus, pesto dip, crackers, edamame and Granny Smith apple and red Bartlett pear slices, and pesto shrimp.

[Yhottys]

And on to the main course!

In the image of the Christmas buffet table below was roast turkey, ham, roasted asparagus with shallots and garlic, mashed potatoes, mashed cauliflower, quinoa salad, potato salad, brown rice, lomi salmon, pancit, macaroni and cheese. Out of sight is the beef roast, gravy, kalua pork, poi and limu (seaweed).

Dessert next!

[blmitch5]

Were making chicken and noodles (for tomorrow) , just like grandma made.

[Steelegood]

On X-Mas morning we awoke to a BLIZZARD, by TN standards (all of about 5"), however we did have the good fortune to be invited to spend X-Mas dinner at that last moment, with our in-law's, bear with me for a few moments, (of course I think our oven unexpectedly going out of commission during the worst possible moment, 'X-Mas eve', had something to do with it!). Ultimately our hosting dinner and/or providing the turkey was out of the question (and considering all, was probably best, because the in-law's would not have driven in this type of weather) and we "only" had ham and the rest of the planned holiday feast. Plan B; we spent the day building snowmen, snow angels, and a snow fort. Of course one of the down sides to being invited to someone else's house for a holiday dinner is, there are no left overs the next day, Augh......... the misery of it all!

Well, what's for dinner tonight? I decided not to let a good turkey go to waste, I can be a determined cook: I brine'd it overnight last night, and then cooked it on the grill in varying 25 to 30 degree weather early this afternoon. We managed to have most all the trimmings; cranberry stuffing, green-bean casserole, candied yams, yeast rolls, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes and gravy, & green jello "salad". However one of our dinner guest, who blew in with the "BLIZZARD", did not afford much time to take pictures of our "mini feast"! Sorry. By the time we served desert, our abominable snowman had disappeared (you don't know my wife....., sent down the garbage disposal, melted, fed to the dog.....,who knows), but probably missed one of the best desert's we have ever had.

I am going to brag here , dinner couldn't have been better, considering having to use the grill in below freezing temps to cook the turkey, and using two toaster ovens to complete the rest of our meal, however, bar-none our literal CROWNING JEWEL for desert was gourmet and haute cuisine, labradoodle gingerbread cookies & ice cream. We sincerely thank our lucky stars these supurb and exquisite animals found their way to our country home.

SINCERE KUDOS TO THE CHEF AND GODS THAT MADE THIS HAPPEN !

[Yhottys]

Man! That is some snow fort Terry. Impressive.

So was your Boxing Day dinner. Even more impressive since you didn't have use of your oven. Kinda like boondocking but with electricity and indoor plumbing.

[Yhottys]

The Alamo crowd decided to redeem themselves at Christmas. During Thanksgiving everything on the dessert table was purchased, all of the Christmas desserts were homemade.

There was a dulce de leche and strawberry sorbet cake with whipped cream frosting (sorry no image of the cake, it was finished when we thought of taking a picture), a 7-Up bundt cake (sorry, no image of that either - same reason), sugar cookies and some coorazy "stained glass" jello dessert that Gemma's mom and aunt loved and that our sister-in-law's aunt made.

[Yhottys]

Originally Posted by Steelegood

Of course one of the down sides to being invited to someone else's house for a holiday dinner is, there are no left overs the next day, Augh......... the misery of it all!

You said it brother. We had grilled cheese sandwiches the day after Christmas.

To make up for it Gemma took Murray out for pizza at Pizza Antica - Lafayette, CA

Gemma had the spaghettini with tomato conserva and Italian sausage. We shared the #5 (Bartlett pear, sweet roasted garlic, and Mount Tam Triple Cream Cheese), the #6 (heirloom potatoes, caramelized onion and white truffle oil) and the #9 (three cheese, shaved broccoli, caramelized onion and pancetta). We brought lots of pizza home.

No dessert. Although we did go to . . .

[Yhottys]

Yes, no dessert but we went to Powell's Sweet Shoppe - Lafayette, CA, which is right across the street from Pizza Antica, BEFORE we had dinner. (There was a twenty minute wait - they don't take reservations.)

We bought a couple of Mo's Chocolate Bacon bars Exotic Chocolate Candy Bars - Milk, Dark & White Chocolate from Vosges Haut-Chocolat - Mo's Milk Chocolate Bacon Bar (Murray), chicken sticks - they'e some sort of hard peanut butter candies, like the peanut butter bar in a Butter Finger without the chocolate (Murray) and some Zotz Classic Candy Time Line: 1794-Today - Photo Gallery - Photo 12 | SAVEUR.com (Gemma - Zotz are her favorite candies - takes her right back to the seventies.)

[Yhottys]

we had pizza for brunch and roast chicken, glazed carrots and steamed rice for dinner.

[Yhottys]

we had dinner at Tavern At Lark Creek The Tavern at Lark Creek

Gemma started with the semolina oysters with scallion cream and pancetta vinaigrette over spinach and frissee, Murray had the beet salad with feta, cashews and deep fried kale (if you gotta eat kale, deep fried is the way to go!). For the main course, Gemma had the dungeness crab spaghetti with extra virgin olive oil and chiles and Murray had the flat iron steak with corona beans and homemade breadcrumbs.

This time we had dessert! Butterscotch pudding for Gemma and this amazing black pepper pineapple cake with coconut lime sorbet (it sounds odd and not very compelling, but it was the kitchen's version of a deconstructed pineapple upside down cake - yummy yellow cake with a brown sugar and butter glaze, really no need for the pineapple) for Murray/Gemma.

[Steelegood]

Originally Posted by Yhottys

(Gemma - Zotz are her favorite candies - takes her right back to the seventies.)

OK, hard to believe that one. Gemma was probably still trying to escape from her crib, or has aged very well....., like a fine wine. But I think escaping from the crib is more like it. But we're wondering 'bout Murry, he does seem like the type to rob the cradle.

Last night, left over turkey dinner. LOVE that Brine'd turkey, We are considering a turkey lasagna made w/ cranberry sauce and cheeses? any opinions out there, has anyone tried something like this? Quick, send help/suggestions before we ruin good turkey!

Steelegood.

[Steelegood]

Don't know about deep fried kale, but we do grow "Bright Lights Swiss
Chard", in the garden in early spring and it is fantastic steamed! with grilled steaks and yeast rolls. Sure is got my mouth watering......, gotta go, just got by "Burpee" seed catalog.

[aluminomad]

we had pierogi's & sausage... yum